Skip to main content
Dessert

Bread or Raised Cake

A sweet cake made from raised dough, butter, sugar, eggs, spices, raisins, and optional brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Bread or Raised Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Mix the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine the raised dough, creamed butter, and creamed sugar.

  2. Add the beaten eggs, dissolved baking soda, grated nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, and raisins.

  3. Mix well and then fold in the beaten egg whites last.

  4. Beat the mixture hard for several minutes.

Rise and bake

  1. Pour into buttered pans and let it rise for 30 minutes.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until done.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Cinnamon + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Nutmeg + raisintop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Raised dough
Provides the yeast-leavened base and structure that the rest of the batter builds on.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender crumb when creamed with the sugar.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps tenderize it when creamed with the butter.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and moisture to the crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the milk to release gas, helping the cake rise and lighten.
Raisins
Add sweetness and chewy pockets of moisture throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Beat the mixture hard for several minutes. Vigorous beating incorporates air and spreads the leavening evenly through the batter, which sets an even crumb. Under-beating can leave pockets, while the batter should still be mixed just until smooth so the crumb does not turn dense.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, milk, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Raisinthe original
  4. Lemonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, milk, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Cinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesBrandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipesClove CakeClove Cake53 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipes